Based on the new book "Kerouac At Bat: Fantasy Baseball And The King Of The Beats" we find out that Kerouac obsessively maintained a fantasy team from his teenage years up until the time of his death with a fictitious league featuring teams like the "New York Chevvies" and the "Cincinnati Blacks." The book claims that Kerouac kept this side of his life a dirty little secret, especially from his too-cool-for-school friends like Allen Ginsberg and William Burroughs.

"I don't think the others knew. Or if they did, they didn't learn it from Kerouac. I think he was worried they might think it childish."

If only Kerouac were still alive today to do podcast chats with Matthew Berry.

A New Book Details Kerouac's Life With Fantasy Baseball [NYT]

In Berry's marathon ESPN chat, he was asked by a reader about the interview and he offered a long response as to why he was upset with Razzball's style of questioning.

Here's some what Berry said in his response:

I was disappointed in the final printed interview as he edited a lot of answers to shine a light on me a certain way and, more importantly, he didn't mention ESPN fantasy baseball at all - the whole reason for the interview. So not really grouchy but definitely didn't engage with him... [J]ust thought it was a little minor league and the kind of thing that gives blogs a bad name. ...The fact that we over four hours in and this is the first question of 10,000 I got about it tells me not a lot of folks read it, either... I was expecting a lot more questions on it.

Razzball was a little taken aback by the slight — especially since ESPN reached out to them to conduct the interview in the first place. They're just little squirrels trying to get a nut in an over-crowded marketplace. So they wondered why Berry was so touchy about some non-softball questions?

Berry responded to an email request to comment on the mini dust-up and reiterated his point:

"I have nothing against them. I checked out the site for the first time after the interview to see how it turned out and they are clearly smart guys who know fantasy baseball. But as I said in the chat, just thought that the way it was conducted - general tone, certain questions - were a little minor league. Not every interview is going to turn out how I would like, and I get that. But since I was asked about it, I felt like I should just be honest about the fact that I was disappointed by it when it happened. I try to be as honest as possible when asked about anything. I also wasn't thrilled with the comments made by Grey after the interview was posted. We spent a little time just talking...not for the interview, but just talking about his site. I shared a few of my experiences and things I did and learned back when I was a small site trying to get noticed. So, I was just surprised by some of what he said. Especially the part about me defending Jeter! I've had Jeter on every fantasy "hate" list I can remember... That was a low blow, saying I liked Jeter. But overall, as I said, it's not a big deal. Part of the gig. I've been called much worse and will be again in the future. (Probably by Deadspin commenters next time there's a photo of me out at a bar)

As someone who has been there with a "mom and pop" site before I got lucky with ESPN I get what they go through. I wish them well. Especially since they have set up a bunch of leagues at ESPN.com. (By the way...did I mention...that this year ESPN Fantasy Baseball - free live scoring, free to play, fully customizable, auction drafts for free, free draft kits - only on ESPN.com? Because if I didn't, I'd like to.)"

Who knew the world of professional fantasy baseball prophecising was so damn catty? It's like the modeling world, only less pretty and more obese.

UPDATE: Razzball responds:

We, like many sports fans and bloggers, have a love/hate relationship with ESPN but Matthew Berry is a good guy. We share his love for fantasy baseball and booze. We don't envy the task of having to write for such a broad audience as ESPN and we're sure he doesn't envy us writing for our comparably niche audience. Glad to see he's not holding a grudge and just said we were a 'little minor league.' Could have been worse - he could've compared us to Skip Bayless or Jay Mariotti. Plus, the 'little minor league' doesn't ring true, as neither Rudy or I are Taiwanese.

Interview With Matthew Berry [Razzball]

Trade Manny Ramirez and Alyssa Milano for Joba Chamberlain. Sell your franchise to The Netherlands. Order Bronson Arroyo to wear the Mr. Redlegs costume. You can do it all with MLB Front Office Manager, the video game whose chief spokesman is, no surprise here, Oakland Athletics general manager Billy Beane.

By bringing in Beane as the game's celebrity spokesperson, 2K Sports is making a big bet that the baseball stat-heads out there will jump at the chance to impersonate Beane, instead of the more common video game proposition of taking on the role of big league players and swinging for the fences.

MLB Front Office Manager is all about trying to navigate the millions of little details that go into the operational side of running a baseball team. From scouting amateur players to drafting them to making trades to figuring out what to do when stars get injured to sucking it up after a losing season and trying again next year.

Unfortunately I can never find the sucking it up button until it's too late.

But my favorite part of the game is changing the toner in the copy machine because it's after 5 and everyone else in the office had gone home.

Billy Beane's Video Game Pitch: You, Too Can Be A Baseball GM [CNet News]

As tends to be the case, MLB — with the NFL piggybacking — wanted to own all the stats. They lost a case in St. Louis about it, and MLB appealed to the Supreme Court, which said no.

The case involved C.B.C. Distribution and Marketing Inc., a Missouri company that tried to get a license from Major League Baseball Advanced Media to use players' names in C.B.C.'s fantasy baseball games.



The case has generated intense interest, not just from Major League Baseball, but other professional sports leagues, including the National Football League. In baseball, even the players' union supported the league.

So, feel free to keep wasting time at your job. And somebody trade us Chris Perez.

Victory For Fantasy Sports [The Business Of Sports]

Yes, those olden days when we hoped these new-fangled computing machines could make it easier to access fantasy baseball stats and pornography. Please, make the days of scanning USA Today box scores and being forced to pay for JUGGS end! Oh, technology, thank you for never disappointing us!

Money quote:

Each night, after the real games are concluded, statistics are gathered and games are "played" in Prodigy's mainframe and personal computers in White Plains, N.Y. The computers keep track of hundreds of leagues, thousands of teams and tens of thousands of statistics each night.

Prodigy! They would charge 25 cents for every email sent per month past the 25-message limit. Those were the days.

Old Style Fantasy Baseball [East Wind Up Chronicle]

Attorneys representing Major League Baseball argued Thursday that online fantasy baseball companies cannot operate without paying license fees to MLB to compensate players for the use of their names. A panel of three judges at the 8th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals seemed skeptical that MLB could take financial control of a game that uses publicly available statistics and widely known names of players. "MLB is like a public religion. Everyone knows (the players') names and what they look like," said U.S. Judge Morris Arnold. "This is just part of being an American, isn't it?"

Major League Baseball is appealing a lower court judgment last year that ruled St. Louis-based CBC Distribution and Marketing does not have to pay licensing fees for MLB players' names and statistics for their online fantasy league games. If MLB wins the appeal, hundreds of online fantasy leagues would go out of business. Unless ...

"With the first pick of the draft, I take Alex Hodrigues, shortstop for the New York Spankees."

You're welcome, online fantasy league owners.

MLB Argues Against Unlicensed Fantasy Leagues [USA Today]

Disenfranchised fantasy baseball players can register at Yahoo! Sports and still play a complete fantasy baseball season. Yahoo! Sports Fantasy Baseball '07 offers rotisserie or point-style games that give players access to scoring data starting on April 1 (opening day).

"Being locked out of your fantasy league is like having a day at the ball park rained out," said Greg DeForest, Yahoo! Sports fantasy executive producer. "All disenfranchised players are welcome at Yahoo! Sports where they won't experience a lockout-shortened season because our retroactive tool ensures fantasy league scoring will include all the action from opening day."

Again, we've never understood why anyone would have used ESPN's fantasy game in the first place — John Kruk in leather pants aside — but honestly, if we'd lost the first week of fantasy stats, we'd be pissed enough to go somewhere, anywhere else as well.

Yahoo! Sports Welcomes Disenfranchised Fantasy Players [Yahoo Sports Blog]
ESPN Pushes The Self Destruct Fantasy Button [Deadspin]

A system error in ESPN.com's Fantasy Baseball League has disrupted live scoring and roster moves since Tuesday. "We're fantasy players ourselves, and we recognize that it is not acceptable for our players to have anything short of a great experience," an ESPN.com spokesman, Paul Melvin, said in a written statement. "We also recognize that getting every problem resolved is what will ultimately satisfy our players."

This has been a common problem with ESPN's fantasy games in the past, but this might be the biggest problem yet. The rocker commercials are kind of funny, though. We now see where the budget all went to. The real mistake: Letting Schrutebag tell his listeners to attack the fantasy site. Whoops!

Disruption on ESPN.com [New York Times]

But we really couldn't let this anecdote about a staffer of the office of recent resignee Tom Delay, from a The New Republic's blog, slide:

In the meantime, [Ed] Buckham had become DeLay's chief of staff.... His win-at-all-costs attitude played out in strange ways around the office. He ran a fantasy baseball league that he always seemed to win, even if it meant browbeating young staffers into trading their best players to him.

We have been in many fantasy baseball leagues, in many offices around this great land of ours. Like everybody else, we've worked for some pretty wretched people. But this, as far we're concerned, this is as loathsome a business practice we can possibly imagine.

The Office NCAA Pool Was Even Worse [TNR's The Plank]